How we fell in love with our voice-activated home assistants

Personal assistants like Amazon’s Alexa already do our bidding. Why do we want them to be our friends too?

A good listener, but not a friend

Howard Lipin/San Diego Union-Tribune/TNS/Alamy Live News

Alexa, play some classical music.

Alexa, set an alarm for 7am.

Alexa, will you marry me?

THEY sit unobtrusively in your home and, with a simple command, check the weather, play a song or set a kitchen timer, rendering many of life’s routine tasks hands-free. Voice-activated devices like the Google Home and Amazon Echo – which responds to the name “Alexa” – are designed to make your life easier.

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